Yesterday I purchased and had a Pioneer 4500nex installed in my 17yo daughter's 2016 Cruze.

She loves the radio!  It sounds so much better than stock, and the added functions (wireless carplay), seemingly unending expandability (2 usb ports, hdmi, sd, DVD)...

But the one thing that casts a shadow over all the above is the absence of a volume knob.

I found an article https://www.instructables.com/Volume-Knob-for-2020-Pioneer-DMH-NEX-Radios/  that details how to make the knob, but i'm not sure it applies to the 4500 (does the 4500 have a W/R Port?) and even if this volume knob would work for the 4500, there is absolutely no way i would trust my limited skillset to a project like this.

I was wondering if anyone else here may have already gone through this, or if there is a retail option rather than homebrewing it.

On 7/3/2022 at 11:41 AM, mozga628 said:

Yesterday I purchased and had a Pioneer 4500nex installed in my 17yo daughter's 2016 Cruze.

She loves the radio!  It sounds so much better than stock, and the added functions (wireless carplay), seemingly unending expandability (2 usb ports, hdmi, sd, DVD)...

But the one thing that casts a shadow over all the above is the absence of a volume knob.

I found an article https://www.instructables.com/Volume-Knob-for-2020-Pioneer-DMH-NEX-Radios/  that details how to make the knob, but i'm not sure it applies to the 4500 (does the 4500 have a W/R Port?) and even if this volume knob would work for the 4500, there is absolutely no way i would trust my limited skillset to a project like this.

I was wondering if anyone else here may have already gone through this, or if there is a retail option rather than homebrewing it.

I actually created this original volume knob project, but while I have the DMH-WT8600NEX the AVH-4500NEX is a different enough animal that I am not sure it would work.  According to crutchfield it does have a W/R line input on the back, but that does not mean it would necessarily work (I would be surprised if it didn't, but you never know).  But I did make a fork of this project to work for IR which this unit does have, so you could use the IR method, (but you would need to place the IR eye somewhere with line-of-sight).  I don't know enough about the 4500NEX to say for sure.  You might want to ask on Reddit (maybe in CarPlay reddit or Pioneer???)  

Another possibility is a universal remote on the steering wheel, that learns the IR commands, like these, (now sure how great this would be though)

https://www.amazon.ca/s?k=universal+IR+remote+steering+wheel&crid=3JO0631WMWKXJ&sprefix=universal+ir+remote+steering+wheel%2Caps%2C90&ref=nb_sb_noss

On 7/3/2022 at 8:41 AM, mozga628 said:

Yesterday I purchased and had a Pioneer 4500nex installed in my 17yo daughter's 2016 Cruze.

She loves the radio!  It sounds so much better than stock, and the added functions (wireless carplay), seemingly unending expandability (2 usb ports, hdmi, sd, DVD)...

But the one thing that casts a shadow over all the above is the absence of a volume knob.

I found an article https://www.instructables.com/Volume-Knob-for-2020-Pioneer-DMH-NEX-Radios/  that details how to make the knob, but i'm not sure it applies to the 4500 (does the 4500 have a W/R Port?) and even if this volume knob would work for the 4500, there is absolutely no way i would trust my limited skillset to a project like this.

I was wondering if anyone else here may have already gone through this, or if there is a retail option rather than homebrewing it.

If you come up with a good solution let me know because I have been wanting to do that for a while now, once I get get my sd card up and running again